Supernova in Fireworks Galaxy

[Davide Simonetti]

A shot of the Type II supernova in the Fireworks Galaxy (NGC 6946) discovered by amateur astronomer Patrick Wiggins on May 14. This animated gif shows two images; one taken on 21 July 2016 and the other taken with a different telescope on 22 May 2017. The difference in quality between the two images is due to the different focal lengths of the two scopes which makes the newer image significantly smaller.

53 x 75 second exposures at 400 ISO
40 x dark frames
79 x flat frames
21 x bias/offset frames (subtracted from flat frames only)

Captured with APT
Guided with PHD2
Processed in Nebulosity and Photoshop 

Equipment:
Sky-Watcher Explorer-150PDS
Celestron NexStar 127 SLT
Skywatcher EQ5 Mount
Orion 50mm Mini Guide Scope
ZWO ASI120 MC imaging and guiding camera
Canon 700D DSLR

[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

Very nice indeed. Spotted this a few nights ago, but don't really have the kit to image it

[laudropb]

Very nice capture and presentation David.

[Davide Simonetti]

25 minutes ago, michael.h.f.wilkinson said:

Very nice indeed. Spotted this a few nights ago, but don't really have the kit to image it

I was amazed (and relieved) that anything came out - I could barely see the galaxy on the subs and it wasn't until I processed it that the supernova became apparent. The weather was very iffy and didn't really clear up until a little before the sky started to get lighter. I actually thought that the supernova had faded away early  

[Davide Simonetti]

23 minutes ago, laudropb said:

Very nice capture and presentation David.

Thank you  

[John]

I too managed to view this one with my 12" scope a few nights ago. Very nice to see it captured in this way David

The host galaxy is faint when observing - much fainter than it's integrated magnitude value of 9.6 might suggest because it's face on to us.

 

[Paul73]

Great capture. Love the animation. 

We've got some clear sky this week. I'll drag out the big Dog and give it a go!

Paul

[Dave In Vermont]

Excellent captures and presentation! A picture truly is worth 1,000 words.

Keep going!

Dave

[StargeezerTim]

Great animation. Glad i wasn't too close to it!  

[cuivenion]

I was trying to view this with my Altair GPCAM using live stacking in Sharpcap, and although it was there it was very hard to make out. Congratulations on a great image.

[Davide Simonetti]

6 hours ago, John said:

I too managed to view this one with my 12" scope a few nights ago. Very nice to see it captured in this way David

The host galaxy is faint when observing - much fainter than it's integrated magnitude value of 9.6 might suggest because it's face on to us.

 

Thanks John. One of the reasons why NGC 6946 is such a faint object despite its 9.6 magnitude is that it lies on the galactic plane and so is obscured by interstellar material in the Milky Way. The first time I imaged it I used my f/12 127 Mak and it took several nights of exposure to get a reasonable image. This time I used a much faster scope and imaged it in a few hours but despite more photons reaching the sensor it still looked pretty faint...and all but invisible on the subs.